3. Raging Bull - (1980, Martin Scorsese)
Scorsese's Raging Bull is particularly close to my heart and is among one my favourite films of all time. Therefore it surprises me greatly that it wasn't unanimously praised by critics and did lukewarm at the box office. The lack of proper advertising meant the film generated fairly little interest and barely broke even; a farcry from the commercial successes of Scorsese's other (in my opinion lesser) films. Some critics were also displeased with the seemingly inescapable violence in the film as well as the entirely unsympathetic protagonist Jake LaMotta. Another source of criticism was the film being a platform for De Niro to showcase subscirption to the school of method acting as opposed to it being a praiseworthy film in its own right. Time magazine said the following:
"Most of Raging Bull exists because of the possibilities it offers De Niro to display his own explosive art."
When reading Mike Evans' The Making of Raging Bull I was stunned to read the drastic impact the early failure of Raging Bull had on poor old Marty. Scorsese is quoted as saying this:
"The idea had been to make the film as openly honest as possible, with no concessions at all for box office or audience. I said "that's it. This is the end of my career. This is the final one."
I'm relieved that Raging Bull didn't signal the end of Scorsese's career: a world without Goodfellas (1990), Gangs of New York (2002) and The Departed (2006) would be a worse place.